posted on October 27, 2004 10:23:26 AM new
I can't believe that this is something the Bush/Cheney folks would do. Really. What would be the point of it?!? Someone has to have hacked their site or something.
Access to the site is blocked
Surfers outside the US have been unable to visit the official re-election site of President George W Bush.
The blocking of browsers sited outside the US began in the early hours of Monday morning.
Since then people outside the US trying to browse the site get a message saying they are not authorised to view it.
The blocking does not appear to be due to an attack by vandals or malicious hackers, but as a result of a policy decision by the Bush camp.
Traffic control
The international exclusion zone around georgewbush.com was spotted by net monitoring firm Netcraft which keeps an eye on traffic patterns across many different sites.
Netcraft said that since the early hours of 25 October attempts to view the site through its monitoring stations in London, Amsterdam and Sydney failed.
Traffic was turned off earlier this week
By contrast Netcraft's four monitoring stations in the US managed to view the site with no problems.
The site can still be seen using anonymous proxy services that are based in the US. Some web users in Canada also report that they can browse the site.
Readers of the boingboing weblog also found that viewers could get at the site by using alternative forms of the George W Bush domain name.
The pattern of traffic to the website suggests that the blocking was not due to an attack by vandals or politically motivated hackers.
Geographic blocking works because the numerical addresses that the net uses to organise itself are handed out on a regional basis.
On 21 October, the George W Bush website began using the services of a company called Akamai to ensure that the pages, videos and other content on its site reaches visitors.
Mike Prettejohn, president of Netcraft, speculated that the blocking decision might have been taken to cut costs, and traffic, in the run-up to the election on 2 November.
He said the site may see no reason to distribute content to people who will not be voting next week.
Managing traffic could also be a good way to ensure that the site stays working in the closing days of the election campaign.
However, simply blocking non-US visitors also means that Americans overseas are barred too.
Akamai declined to comment, saying it could not talk about customer websites.
posted on October 27, 2004 10:29:59 AM new
I really don't think they did this purposefully, if they did it at all. What would be the point? I know that Bush is insular, but preventing folks in other countries from viewing his site would be just plain dumb. It would arouse more bad press, which Bush & Co. certainly don't need...
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"Bad temper is its own scourge. Few things are more bitter than to feel bitter. A man's venom poisons himself more than his victim." --Charles Buxton
posted on October 27, 2004 10:35:42 AM new
Didn't something happen in the past to a website when it was pre-planned that everyone would log on at the same time....thus basically shutting it down from overload.
Maybe this blockage was intentional to keep that from happening by some unsavory kerry supporters.
posted on October 27, 2004 11:10:29 AM new
If that were the case, Linda, everyone regardless of location would be unable to get in--or experience extreemly slow log on. And the message that one wasn't "authorized to view" the site would not be displayed...
____________________
"Bad temper is its own scourge. Few things are more bitter than to feel bitter. A man's venom poisons himself more than his victim." --Charles Buxton
